Ladysmith

Ladysmith, British Columbia Real Estate: “Heritage by the Sea”

Ladysmith is a vibrant seaside community that lies on the 49th Parallel on the east coast of Vancouver Island, approximately ninety kilometres north of Victoria. Its geographical location makes for an easy, twenty-minute commute to Duncan (to the south) or Nanaimo (to the north); also attractive is its proximity to B.C. Ferries’ terminals Duke Point and Departure Bay, providing multiple daily sailings to the Lower Mainland.

There are many reasons to consider moving to Ladysmith. Peaceful and family orientated, it has a deep-seeded sense of community: There are numerous events throughout the year (see the list below!) that attract thousands of people from near and far. The town takes pride in its heritage: on nearly every corner of historic First Avenue stands a relic from a bygone era that helped shape Ladysmith into the place it is today. Enjoy the many amenities of the revitalized downtown core, go on an artifacts heritage walk, enjoy the vast trail systems that meander through the surrounding forests, take in a show at the ocean-front, 1000-person amphitheatre… It’s no wonder that houses and condos for sale in Ladysmith sell quickly!

Are you looking to buy or sell a home in Ladysmith? If you require the services of a Ladysmith Realtor, or have any questions about the Ladysmith Real Estate Market, call Jurgan today (604) 626-1391.

James Dunsmuir: Industrialist, Politician and Boer War Fanboy Creates a Town

Originally named “Oyster Harbour”, Ladysmith was founded circa 1898 by James Dunsmuir, who had the year before built shipping wharves in the harbour for loading coal from his Extension Mines. First Avenue was erected virtually overnight, as buildings-many of which still stand today-were moved by oxen and rail from nearby Extension and Wellington. The town was built to house coal miners and their families.

Dunsmuir, like many people at the time, was entranced with the events of the Second Boer War; he named Ladysmith after a town in South Africa that was successfully defended by the British for four agonizing months. Many of the streets are named after the generals involved in this victory: Buller, Kitchener, Baden-Powell, Methuen and Symonds, to name a few.

From the onset, Ladysmith experienced rapid expansion and economic growth; later, several mining disasters led to the Great Strike of 1912-1914. One of the longest strikes in Canadian History and fraught with violence and recession, the worker’s fight to unionize ended only with the arrival of WWI.

Source: WIKI

“I always tried to turn every disaster into an opportunity.”

-John D. Rockefeller.

By the 1930s, the future of Ladysmith was in jeopardy: The Extension mine area, now basically a Real Estate suburb of Nanaimo closed in 1931 and most of the town found themselves unemployed with no new job opportunities in sight. The population, which at it’s heyday had soared to 5,000, now dwindled at around 1000, as homes were abandoned and defaulted to the city for unpaid taxes.

A freak storm essentially saved Ladysmith: In 1933, winds ripped through the mountains behind the town-which happened to be owned by the Rockefeller Foundation of New York City-and blew over thousands of trees. The Comox Logging and Railway Company convinced Rockefeller to sell the land so that the felled trees would not go to waste; within three years the company had begun logging, clearing and shipping timber from the Harbour to the mainland. The new industry breathed life into the virtual ghost town as hundreds returned to live and work in Ladysmith.